Rosamond, like the girl she resembled, sat, girl fashion, on a
pile of cushions close by the fire; and Stephen, her husband, not far
away, by a table with a drop-light, was absorbed in a book. Uncle Rufus
was examining a pile of photographs on the other side of the table. Ted
sprawled on a couch at the far end of the room, deep in a boy's
magazine, a reading light at his elbow. At the opposite end of the room,
where the piano stood, Roberta, music rack before her, was drawing her
bow across nearly noiseless strings, while Ruth picked softly at her
harp: indications of intention to burst forth into musical strains when
a hush should chance to fall upon the company.
Judge Calvin Gray alone was absent from the gathering, and even as
Louis's eyes wandered about the pleasant room, his uncle's figure
appeared in the doorway. As if he were answering his sister Ruth, Judge
Gray spoke his thought.
"I wonder," said he, advancing toward the fireside, "if anywhere in this
wide world there is a happier family life than this!"
Louis sprang up to offer Judge Gray the chair he had been occupying--a
favourite, luxuriously cushioned armchair, with a reading light beside
it ready to be switched on at will, which was Uncle Calvin's special
treasure, of an evening.
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